Samarkand

Samarkand, the capital of ancient Sogdiana, is one of the oldest cities in the world, of the same age as Rome, Athens and Babylon. It is twenty-five centuries old. During those centuries the city has survived many great and dramatic events. Samarkand saw Saka and Massagets, Greeks and Macedonians, Karakitais, Arab commanders and hordes of Genghis Khan. Under Amir Timur's governing Samarkand became the capital of his huge empire. The Great Silk Road went through the city. Famous scientists and poets of the Medieval Orient lived and worked in Samarkand.

Its geographical location in the picturesque valley of the Zerafshan River gave Samarkand (formerly also known as Maracanda) an advantage over other cities of Central Asia.

The exact antiquity of Samarkand is hard to establish. Originally Samarkand occupied the Mount of Afrosiab that rises to the north of modern Samarkand. The city grew and expanded its borders. It was one of the flourishing satrapies of the Achaemenid Empire from about 6th century BC. Alexander the Great led his marching armies in 325 BC to assert his claim over the lost provinces of the Achaemenids. It took him quite a while to quell the Sogdian rebellion. Passing through the remnant of Hellenic Dynasties, Samarkand was captured by the Sassanids under whom the arts and crafts flourished.

After the invasion of Arabs in the 8th century AD a new era of Samarkand began. The Arab assimilation with the local population gave rise to various new Muslim dynasties, the Samanids, Karakhanids, Seljukids and Genghisids. When the Mongols captured Samarkand the ancient water supply system was destroyed, and the life in the city collapsed. It took a whole century to recover from the after-effects of the Mongol invasion. The plundered and destroyed Samarkand was rebuilt on the site of one of its former suburbs.
During the reign of Amir Timur (Tamerlane) Samarkand enjoyed its best times serving as the capital. Tamerlane's successive campaigns to Persia brought master craftsmen and builders to the area, who contributed to the glorious era when Samarkand was beheld bedecked with the most beautiful of monuments in the form of mosques, madrasahs, gardens and mausoleums. According to Timur's idea, Samarkand was intended to overshadow all capitals of the world by its grandeur and beauty.

The grandson of Tamerlane, Ulugbek, ruled there until 1449 and made Samarkand the intellectual centre. However, the rise of nomadic Uzbeks spelt the end of Timurid power and Samarkand's prosperity. When the Uzbek Shaybanids moved their capital to Bukhara, Samarkand was left doomed to decline until the Bukhara Emir repopulated it in the 1770s.

In May 1868 Russian Tsarist army overtook the city and Samarkand was linked to the Russian Empire. In 1924-1930 Samarkand was the capital of the Uzbek Soviet Socialist Republic.